Attention Jedi Master Spock: Vandalism of Database articles!

Post by **Mike DiCenso** » Tue Jul 15, 2008 9:27 pm

JMS, I'am sure you may be aware of it, but some person or persons has been going around altering the Open Database's articles. An example is found in the history here for your entry and one other article on the forum itself.

Warning: Both of the vandal entries are highly obscene and or derogatory. The second one looks to be a cut and paste of the SDN wiki article for SJF. I reverted the articles back to their original contents. You may wish to limit access to the Database or to those particular articles until the perpetrator(s) can be tracked down.
-Mike

Mr. Oragahn · Post by **Mr. Oragahn** » Tue Jul 15, 2008 10:46 pm

Fantastic. It was about time we had idiots being given a chance to display their formidable intelligence.
The Wiki will just need to be modded severely.
Funnily, those comments are all SDN's bile against this site in a nutshell.
I'll let you decide who posted those entries.

Post by **Mike DiCenso** » Wed Jul 16, 2008 12:14 am

I suspect there is more article vandalism somewhere in the Database, but I simply do not have the time to go through all 194 articles. If you have a suspect based on the "style" of the vandalism, Mr. Oragahn, you may want to PM them to JMS.

As for curtailing access to the Database, it occurs to me now that perhaps that is what whoever did this wants as one of the criticisms against the SDN wiki is it's requirement for those wishing to write or alter articles is to register first, thus in turn controling who gets that privilege, and prevent the subjects of some of their articles from changing or deleting their derogatory slander. So by making JMS restrict access to the Database, then we look no better in comparison.
-Mike

Post by **Mike DiCenso** » Wed Jul 16, 2008 12:51 am

I found more vandalism while skimming around the articles. The SDN bbs entry was changed to be derogatory to SFJ forum and JMS in general.

It would seem that whoever is doing this vandalism of the articles seems to be concentrating on attacking JMS and SFJ with a definite grudge.
-Mike

Mr. Oragahn · Post by **Mr. Oragahn** » Wed Jul 16, 2008 1:30 am

Mike DiCenso wrote:I suspect there is more article vandalism somewhere in the Database, but I simply do not have the time to go through all 194 articles. If you have a suspect based on the "style" of the vandalism, Mr. Oragahn, you may want to PM them to JMS.

Just thinking out loud. :)

As for curtailing access to the Database, it occurs to me now that perhaps that is what whoever did this wants as one of the criticisms against the SDN wiki is it's requirement for those wishing to write or alter articles is to register first, thus in turn controling who gets that privilege, and prevent the subjects of some of their articles from changing or deleting their derogatory slander. So by making JMS restrict access to the Database, then we look no better in comparison.
-Mike

Registring here is free. If at least JMS can give a "licence" to edit the wiki, the problem will be solved, and I have no issue with such a possibility.
It would certainly solve the minor annoyance that this anon is.

Post by **Jedi Master Spock** » Wed Jul 16, 2008 1:56 am

A few articles were injected with "improvements" from one or more visiting SDN members (as you can see in the changelogs, more than one IP address was involved). I don't think there were many other articles changed. There's really very little activity on the wiki, positive or negative. I am frankly not worried. If it gets out of hand, I can start blocking IPs by the dozen very easily.

I would encourage you to look at the wiki more and edit it more. Frankly, I don't see any problem with SDN members contributing to SFJ wiki articles; if anything, the increase in activity is good for the wiki. True, you judged their contributions lacking in merit in this case, but there's nothing to say that they can't contribute anything worthwhile to the wiki.

As Mike DiCenso rightly points out, the SFJ style is for free and open discussion rather than heavy-handed moderation, restrictive registration practices, and the like. Let SDN continue to suppress dissenting views all they like, but I'm not about to start doing it here. If someone wants to write something about sucking cock on my userpage on the wiki, it reflects poorly on them - not me. If they persist, of course, their IPs will be blocked.

Our rules are simple, straightforward, and do not substantially restrict discussion. The discussion forum is about to turn two years old, and I've still only issued one single-day temp-ban to a human for excessive flaming and summarily squelched one probable-human overnight imagespam incident. The wiki was launched over two years ago (three months before the forum) and I have yet to see the need to actually ban anything other than spambots from it. Those haven't been a problem lately due to code updates.

Praeothmin · Post by **Praeothmin** » Wed Jul 16, 2008 4:28 pm

I actually have a hard time believing that SDN "core" residents would resort to tactics like this.

They have never been shy of telling us, in our face, what they thought of us or our opinions.
We may not agree or like their way of communicating, but at least they're honest about their views.

I believe this comes from immature SDNers, probably the kiddies on the board who thought it would be funny.

Franckly, it doesn't really matter, because they'll soon find something else more interesting ("Oh, wow, look guys, I've just hit puberty") and move on... ;)

Ted C · Post by **Ted C** » Wed Jul 16, 2008 5:49 pm

You might consider requiring users to register before they edit your wiki. That will make it a bit more tedious to be a vandal, at least.

Praeothmin · Post by **Praeothmin** » Thu Jul 17, 2008 11:49 am

Ted's suggestion has some merit.
Without setting stringent rules, at least by allowing only registered people to edit, it allows better damage control.

But, as I said, it will pass once they find something more interesting (look... Shiny! ).

Post by **Mike DiCenso** » Fri Jul 18, 2008 6:19 am

No, I think the timing of this attack coincides a little too much with some recent going-ons. So I have my suspicions now as to who the vandal(s) might be.

Thus, rather than placing a general restriction on the Database, it would be better to investigate more closely who's behind it, and cut them off, especially if they are a registered member.
-Mike

Who is like God arbour · Post by **Who is like God arbour** » Fri Jul 18, 2008 4:52 pm

Then what's your suspicions?

Who is the evildoer?

What are the recent going-ons, you have mentioned, and how do they relate to that vandalism?

If you don't want to say it publicly, PM me.

Post by **Mike DiCenso** » Fri Jul 18, 2008 5:42 pm

No offense, WILGA, but I would rather just PM JMS about this, and see what he thinks. Until JMS has a chance to investigate those suspicions, I would rather not say anything publicly just in case I am wrong.
-Mike

Ted C · Post by **Ted C** » Thu Jul 24, 2008 1:18 pm

OK, now your front page has been vandalized. I don't know about anything else yet. If you haven't locked key pages like the home page, I suggest you get to that right away.

EDIT: BTW, I think I'll revert the front page if I can.

Ted C · Post by **Ted C** » Thu Jul 24, 2008 1:22 pm

The comedian signed in as "JediMaster Spock". I've never used it myself, but there should be a way to mass-undo all edits by that user.

Post by **Jedi Master Spock** » Fri Jul 25, 2008 12:29 am

Ted C wrote:The comedian signed in as "JediMaster Spock". I've never used it myself, but there should be a way to mass-undo all edits by that user.

It is quite easy to wipe out all the edits made by any particular user from the administrator seat.